


wires through my veins

by the_embarrasing_garden



Category: The Mechanisms (Band)
Genre: Angst, Jonny has a bad time, Post-Story: Out (The Mechanisms), Story: Out (The Mechanisms), The Mechanisms-Typical Temporary Character Death, i still dont know how to tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-10
Updated: 2021-02-10
Packaged: 2021-03-16 13:02:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29332740
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_embarrasing_garden/pseuds/the_embarrasing_garden
Summary: Jonny settled on his only viable solution. He stood, wiping tears off his face, setting off down the hall with the sensation of Aurora’s cameras- eyes- boring into his back. He went, and he retrieved a toolbox.
Kudos: 30





	wires through my veins

**Author's Note:**

> warning: this one is,, once again just me going ham on the angst machine so.. warnings for:  
> electrocution, temporary character death, out-typical angst themes 
> 
> enjoy :)

Something was wrong. 

In fact, there were a great deal many things wrong, too many to count. The one currently occupying the forefront of Jonny’s mind was the sharp pain in his shoulder, where a harsh jolt of electricity had shot through it. This was not anything Jonny hadn’t experienced before, he was hardly a stranger to live wires and Aurora needing repairs was almost constant. Some part of her was always being meticulously worked on, removing the panelling shoved coldly into her skin and replacing it, or wiring being reworked, guided into more comfortable positions. It could be relied upon that Aurora was gently being eased from the indifferent wars of her past, into a loving present.    
  


Except it couldn’t, could it? Not anymore. 

_ Not ever,  _ Jonny’s brain supplied.  _ Never again.  _

He slams his hand into the wall.    
  


_ Don’t hit me.  _ Aurora, speaking directly into his mind, snaps at him. 

“Don’t fucking electrocute me, then!” he snaps back, aloud.    
_ It wasn’t my fault! Evidently, something needs repairing.  _ _  
_ “Evidently.” 

Neither said anything then. Jonny supposed he could ask Ashes, they’d had some training in engineering and repairs, and whatever this was, it could hardly be a difficult task. The flaw in this plan was that, in order for him to ask Ashes, he’d have to explain. Explain why he was asking them, not Nastya, why he was asking at all. In theory, could he do that? Yes, of course. Ashes was hardly a difficult member of the crew to find. Could Jonny offer them an explanation? Yes, he knew the words and the story. In theory. In reality, he would find himself struggling to approach them, likely covering his initial intent with whatever came to mind next. If not, fumbling with the question, hardly able to look them in the eyes. And when it came to an explanation? Well, he knew he would find a tightness like claws clutched around his throat, his eyes filling with tears- the same way that was happening now as he weighed his options- and it would all come spilling out of him in a horrendous, gutting cascade.    
  
He couldn’t allow for that.    
No, Jonny had been fiercely protective of those close to him for a very long time, and he intended on protecting them from this information too. 

He could just leave it, whatever this issue was, let it fester and rot. No, he couldn’t. For if he did that, a deep sense of betrayal would settle within his already aching body, and never leave. It would grow as the ship deteriorated around him, consuming him as his surrounds cried out in pain. It would be unfair.    
  
Jonny settled on his only viable solution. He stood, wiping tears off his face, setting off down the hall with the sensation of Aurora’s cameras-  _ eyes _ \- boring into his back. He went, and he retrieved a toolbox.    
  


_ You have no idea what you’re doing.  _ Aurora protests as he returns to the offending panel.    
“You want me to leave it?”    
She sighs, deeply, and there’s a pause in the gentle background hum of machinery as she thinks. 

_ No. It needs to be fixed. I will talk you through it.  _   
Internally, Jonny breathes a sigh of relief.    
“How kind of you.”    
A blast of cold air shoots across his face, Aurora’s equivalent to punching him in the arm.    
He stares down at the toolkit in his hands, realising very quickly that he has no idea what anything is, or where even to begin. Doubt begins to settle in the pit of his stomach. What if he fucks this up? 

_ You need a spanner, to remove the plating.  _ _  
_ Spanner, spanner, spanner... Jonny scans over the contents of the box. Surely he knows what a spanner is. Apparently not, and he stares for a moment before a wire extends, wrapping around something and moving it into his hands. He makes a small noise of thanks and begins to work on removing the bolts. 

They work in an uncomfortable pseudo-silence for a while, only really speaking when Jonny needs instruction. Which is constant, so it ends up being a lot of Aurora talking at him, her tone clipped and impatient, making noises at him every time he takes too long at something. The intricacies are causing a pressing headache behind his eyes. He’s not used to such delicate work, hardly ever done something requiring such finicky work. Harsh, loud and violent, that was his forte. 

_What’re you going to do?_   
The question comes from out of the blue, interrupting Jonny as he follows the latest set of instructions. Assuming this is what the question is about, he relays them back to her.   
“Remove the wire from its casing, use this-” he picks up a tool from the box and waves it, “to weld the two parts back together, reattach casing. I am actually listening, you know.”  
_That isn’t what I meant._ _  
_ Jonny curses under his breath.   
“Do I have to do something?” 

Unimpressed silence.

“I don’t know.” He admits softly.    
_ You have to tell the crew.  _ _  
_ “I don’t think I can.”   
_ What you can do has no role. You need to.  _

In that moment, though it only flutters across his mind for a second, Jonny finds himself wishing Nastya was right.

  
  
He physically recoils at it, astounded, a hand clapped across his mouth as the tool it held moments before falls to the floor with an offensive metallic clanging. Is he truly that cruel, that heartless? He finds his actions mere days before flooding back to him unbidden. How harsh he had been, mocking, shut off. How utterly careless. No wonder, he found himself thinking, no wonder she thought no one cared. How could he know that he did?

_ Are you alright?  _ Aurora’s previously clipped tone has dropped, now expressing genuine concern for the panicking first mate. How can he respond? He can hardly tell her that he just wished death upon her, wished for this whole situation to effectively be validated- because if she were gone, dead as assumed, maybe the ache in his bones wouldn’t be so bad, the tears that once again spring to his eyes banished, the overwhelming sense of loss, of wrongness, all of it. Maybe that would be gone.    
He says none of this.    
Jonny is not a heartless man.   
  
“I’m gonna fucking miss her.” Is what he says instead.   
  
That’s just it, isn’t it? Enough to shatter whatever wall within his heart has been pausing his emotions until now. He feels it, like a blade through the mechanics, grinding the gears to a halt. Though the actual preventative measure is coded into him, not physical, all numbers and patterns, neatly arranged to stop him feeling. You see, people, hearts, are very easily broken. Jonny’s had been, millennia ago. Upon finding him, the good Doctor had written a preventative measure into him, in some twisted attempt at protection, to stop him ever experiencing the same pure emotion that had killed him the first time. Whatever that was, it just snapped.    
  
Jonny feels it hit him like a wave, centuries of restrained agony hitting him in one go. He screams, clutching at his chest as it tears through him, the raw truth of what has become his life slamming at the sides of his skull, ricocheting around the metal arteries and ventricles of his heart, his heart that ticked as dropped the first match of his new life, the heart stopped him time and time again from regretting, from hurting, from helping, His heart that cut the words from his tongue when he needed them most, as he watched the airlock doors close.    
  
Jonny crumples to the floor with a thud.

Dead, and alone. 

When he returns, a heavy coat has been laid gently around his shoulders.

**Author's Note:**

> hope i succeeded in crushing you all! thank you for reading <3 
> 
> genuinely i think I'm kinda happy with this? i feel like the pacing/general structure is a bit off, but its alright   
> (title is from sleeping beauty - the mechanisms)


End file.
